The crisp morning air vibrated with the ringing of the city bell, signaling the first phase of Aureus and Cahira's harebrained scheme to kill a Deathless and liberate Nysara.

This is our best option, Aureus thought, only half-convinced. Sunlight shone through the window of the abandoned twenty-first-story apartment, warming his stubbled face through the chalk-drawn ley lines on the glass.

Although he'd done his best to dry the pane before drawing his final version of the ley line configuration, he worried the moisture from the previous night's rain would distort his work and cause a misfire. More importantly, he hoped he'd remembered to use the correct designs, which he'd conjured purely from memory without a reference. Guess I'll know soon enough—either I'll destroy the Deathless or blow myself up and take the building with me.

Outside, Cahira continued ringing the bell in the hopes of luring the Deathless to the top of the tower in clear view of his position across the shingled city rooftops a few blocks away. Though he'd yet to see the creature, she had assured him that if it took position on the tower, its enormous size would ensure a direct hit, but he'd need to wait at least twenty seconds for her to get clear before firing. And if he waited too long, he risked the Deathless losing interest and flying away.

One chance—that's all we're going to get. He ground his teeth, watching the incessant sway of the bell's silhouette as he waited.

Movement, coming from the bridge at the city's center, caught his attention. An enormous shadow with bat-shaped wings, beating out a steady rhythm from the back of a humanoid body, flew toward the bell tower.

"Come on, Cahira...get out of there," Aureus murmured.

The Deathless slowed as it neared the tower, shifting its spectral form to hang vertically in the air. The bell stopped, and the Deathless reached out to grasp a pillar of the belfry with a clawed, all-too-human hand.

Aureus took up position on the opposite side of the room, arm outstretched, fingers splayed—aim unobstructed by the table and chairs of the apartment dining room he and Cahira had cleared earlier that morning. Concentrating, he willed his reserve of magic to form in his palm and started counting backward from twenty.

The Deathless, perched wholly on the tower's upper exterior, released a deafening roar.

"Sixteen...fifteen...fourteen...thirteen..."

The Deathless reached inside the tower, ripped the one-ton bell away from its headstock, and flung it like a toy over its shoulder onto the building below.

Visible traces of magic coalesced into Aureus's palm, forming an orb that bathed the room in blue light.

"Eight...seven...six..."

The Deathless released another angry roar and plunged a curled fist into the belfry, decimating the top of the tower.

"Three..."

The orb spun rapidly in his hand, humming as it gathered strength.

"Two..."

The Deathless pulled its hand back, revealing Cahira—struggling uselessly three hundred feet in the air.

Scenarios flooded Aureus's mind: Cahira crushed, ripped apart, incinerated by his spell...

"Kill it!" her voice echoed. "Kill it now!"

The sum of Aureus's magic thrummed in his palm, threatening to break free. He felt his control slipping.

"Do it!"

The Deathless hovered in the crosshairs of the ley lines, maw opening as if to consume her whole. It was a perfect shot—all Aureus had to do was force his magic through the window...

"Do it, Cyrus!"

An Unseelie proverb, recalled by memory in Xiomara's lilting voice, sprung to the forefront of his mind, its relevance suddenly clear in witness of Cahira's final, valiant cry. Every path leads to Death's embrace. Choose a path, and Death may walk with you a while longer.

The Deathless started moving away from the tower.

Aureus fired.

And the room exploded.

The force of it knocked him through the wall. Debris pummeled him from the upper floor, and a wave of heat swept over his body. Splintered timber ignited into blue flames.

Ears ringing, Aureus tried to walk, but toppled forward when a burning beam collapsed into a heap where he'd been standing. He crawled forward through a narrow hallow, pushing rubble from his path—spellsmoke wracking his lungs—and found room to stand on the other side.

Morning light shone unimpeded on what was left of the exterior wall. There was nothing but a sheer drop where the dining room had been, exposing the floors above and below.

Outside, a cloud of dust and smoke billowed from the bell tower. He'd not only managed to hit it—he'd demolished it.

Cahira...

He coughed, and pain surged in his gut. Glancing down, he quickly spotted the source. A wooden spike, half as thick as his palm and just as long, lodged near the right side of his waist. He gingerly cupped it, and a wave of nausea sent him reeling. Blood leaked from the wound, soaking his clothing, and threatened to gush.

Shit.

The building groaned.

Aureus edged toward the nearest intact wall away from the worst of the fire, careful not to stumble over the precipice, and settled. A shrill, angry shriek ripped through the air, drawing his attention to the horizon. The smoke parted, and a shadow emerged.

Unlike the tower, the Deathless was intact, save for the arm it'd held Cahira with. It roared, ending its bellow with a discordant screech, and soared toward him.

Completely tapped out of magic and trapped by rubble, Aureus had no other choice.

He leapt...

And landed on a strip of exposed flooring on the story below, knocking the wind from his lungs. Despite the adrenaline fueling his effort to run, a sharp pain from his side rippled through his body, hindering his movement. The building shuddered as the Deathless collided with the floor above.

He rammed through what was left of the nearest door and tumbled into the hall. A cloud of dust and smoke enveloped him as he ran, obscuring his view of the stairwell. Debris rained from above as the ceiling gave way to a massive claw. Cut off from the stairs, he veered left, away from the Deathless, but the door he'd aimed for resisted his attempt to ram it down. Repelled, he stumbled and fell. A shadowy talon lashed out, striking the door he tried to ram, and the wall burst open as the Deathless lacerated it. It withdrew, and a voice like a breaking mountain boomed as if it were coming from every direction, "You cannot run forever, Valerius!"

Aureus cried out—not from the pain of his wound, but from the mounting pressure in his skull. Somehow, the Deathless had reached out to touch his thoughts.

It forced its way into his mind, tearing through his memories with ruthless, intelligent precision—sifting through them, searching. Aureus's life flashed before his eyes—yet even in agony, he resisted.

"Surrender!"

Looking up at Madrona from where he stood in the Arcanarium kitchens. Smiling, she offered him a strawberry tart. "Share with Ilias. Off with you now," she said. The memory gave way to another. He, Ilias, and Killian—barely twelve years old—running through the college greenhouse in a desperate escape after stealing grape clusters.

More memories rushed to the surface.

Ilias in the fetal position on the ground, hands covering his face to protect it from the group of teenagers kicking him, screaming for his mother's help. "Half-wit!" one attacker said. "Oaf!" shouted another. "Leave him alone!" Aureus's fist, colliding with the nearest bully's face. Killian joining the fray.

His first time seeing Xiomara, lecturing during a seminar on fae casting techniques. Her bright teeth flashing, sharp nose wrinkling in a smile after hearing his joke in the tavern later that night.

Xiomara, clothed in a dress of enchanted autumn leaves, dancing joyfully on the ballroom floor.

Their first kiss on the balcony.

Her lifeless body.

A strident cry tore from his throat. He pushed the memory away, but the Deathless wrenched relentlessly at another.

Standing on the outer edge of a circle of ley lines. Arcanarium adepts, mages, and arcanists carrying out the experiment he'd helped orchestrate. A surge of light rushing toward him. Ley lines exploding in a burst of blue and purple flame—incinerating over a dozen people and scattering dozens more away from the center. Agonized screams drowning out all else.

"You are not Valerius," the Deathless said.

Killian, questioning and torturing him in the Arcanarium dungeons. A burst of a flame, his childhood friend reduced to ash.

Aureus screamed.

"Mere progeny, but just as reckless..."

An ether car exploding on train tracks.

Xiomara kissing him in the dark, her body beneath his.

Hexwardens surrounding him. A gunship falling amidst panicked shouts. Xiomara, silhouetted against the fires of Alatyr—standing calmly against the backdrop of the city's destruction.

The Deathless spoke again, "Like him, you seek mastery over the Great Cycle. What folly..."

Aureus's mind careened back into the present. He gasped for air, lungs burning. He staggered to his feet as a tremor shook the floor. The building groaned again, then shuddered under the force of another impact. He heaved himself over the waist-high gap in the wall and into an apartment.

The wall dividing the adjacent apartment had been demolished, providing access to its entry door on the other side of the debris. He stumbled through the wreckage of both apartments and back into the hall.

Another collision from above shook the building, and the Deathless reached out again as Aureus fled down the stairwell. "Who do you hope to save in a city of the dead?"

Another memory dashed to the forefront of his mind. Cahira's sword pointing at his face—suspicious, desperate, accusing...

"You are alone, mortal. Humanity has sealed its fate. You cannot win."

Aureus caught himself on the railing and lurched forward, nearly falling down the stairs at several turns as he descended. Need to get out. Need to hide, he thought, staggering through the lobby on the ground floor. Teetering on the edge of consciousness, he made it outside and collapsed in the street.

The Deathless descended, nearly crushing him as it landed. "Embrace me... Submit."

Helpless, Aureus watched as the Deathless raised its only arm—claw curled into a fist, poised to strike.

"Leave him alone!"

Cahira appeared, casting fireballs from her palms at the dark monstrosity like a figure out of legend.

She twirled expertly to catch snatches of stray magic with one hand and weaved them back into concentrated orbs with the other, hurtling them at the Deathless. One concussive blow after another, she drove it back.

It tried to fly, but the hexwarden brought it down swiftly with a well-aimed barrage. Its wings dissipated, and the Deathless plummeted to the ground. A shockwave rippled through the street, uprooting signs, lampposts, and cobblestones with a continuous, deafening crack.

Cahira cast a barrier to shield herself and Aureus from the debris and released it as soon as the threat passed. The magic from the barrier coalesced into a fiery orb between her palms, and she thrust her arms forward, a steady stream of fire erupting from her hands.

Consumed by the conflagration, the Deathless roared and thrashed against the building behind it, its ability to damage its surroundings inhibited by its rapidly diminishing size.

Aureus stayed conscious long enough to hear the Deathless release one final, ear-splitting shriek before its form dispersed in an inky cloud of smoke and shadow.

He awoke hours later, strewn out on a bedroll in the cellar hideout. It was dark, and the only light he could see by was the sputtering flame beneath the cookpot. Cahira, no longer clad in hexwarden gear, slept soundly in her chair by the stairs leading to the alleyway exit. A partially healed gash marred her forehead, but aside from bruises on her arms and collarbone, she seemed otherwise unharmed.

He rose, stifling a groan from the soreness in his limbs and neck. The thin blanket fell away, revealing his bare torso, and the graze of fabric on his legs told him he was naked. Instead of a bandage or a bloody spike, only a faint, oval scar marked the spot where he'd been impaled.

Startled, Cahira awoke. "Hey, hey, hey," she said, kneeling at his side. "Not too fast, alright?"

He allowed her to guide him back to the bedroll. "What happened?" he asked, voice cracking. "Did we do it?"

She chortled. "We? Sure—you botching the whole plan and almost blowing me to smithereens worked out great."

"Fair enough. Though I'm not the one who got caught..."

"Hey, I told you the window thing was a bad idea. I may not be an arcanist, but even I know passing magic through a breakable configuration like that was downright stupid. If you'd just given me access to your magic in the first place, we could've avoided the whole fiasco."

She continued before he could reply, crouching beside him, "I'd heard about people being born with special gifts, but that's one hell of a convenient one, all things considered. After you knocked that thing to the ground, I managed to get loose when its arm disappeared. It wasn't until it started flying toward you that I realized I could cast again. And whew"—she clapped her hands, excited—"what a rush! I've never wielded that much power all at once! I even had enough left over to heal us both—mostly." She grazed the edge of the gash on her forehead, winced, and sucked the half-dried blood from her thumb. "Stings like hell..."

"Are you okay?"

She shrugged. "I'll be fine. Nothing compared to the shape you were in. Pretty sure you fractured your left leg. And that puncture wound would've been a shitty way to go."

"I didn't know hexwardens were trained in both healing and combat..."

"We're not, typically. Lucky for you, I was a first-response healer before signing on with the Arcanarium."

"I see... Thanks, Cahira, truly. You're amazing."

Grinning, she said, "Hell yeah, I am! You aren't always the smartest or most talented guy in the room, you know."

"No," he replied, smiling, "I suppose not."

"You think you'd be able to hand off some magic again? Once you're better, of course."

"I don't think so. All out, I'm afraid."

Cahira narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips, seeming ready to challenge him, but to his relief, she shrugged and said, "Well, that's too bad... Can't be helped, I guess."

Aureus grunted his agreement, eager to change the subject. "So, when can I get up and about, doc?"

"Now's as good a time as any, I guess. Just take it slow, all right? Make sure everything is where it should be. I've had trouble with accidentally fusing ribs together in the past."

He inched upward. "That's not very funny."

"I wasn't joking."

Alarmed, he met her gaze. Her face broke into a sheepish grin. "Gotcha."

The pain from his laughter was considerably worse than any caused by sitting up straight. Even so, he determined it was nothing more than soreness from his ordeal and that nothing felt out of place.

"Oh! I almost forgot," Cahira said, reaching for a bundle at the foot of the bedroll. "Your clothes were ruined after I had to cut them off you. You're about my brother's size. The size he was, I mean. I figured you could use them."

Resting atop the bundle was a blood-stained envelope, unsealed but enclosed by a tucked-in seal flap. "What's this?" he asked, picking it up.

"Not sure," she replied, shrugging. "It was in your shirt pocket. Figured I wouldn't read it unless you died."

Firelight shone through the paper, briefly revealing the swirling lines of finely penned script within its folds. He recognized it immediately.

Xiomara's handwriting.

"Something wrong?" Cahira asked.

"I'm fine. Just...forgot I had this is all," he lied.

"Gotcha... Well, I'll let you get dressed. If you're still set on leaving tonight, I'll escort you to the north end of town." She moved to leave.

"Cahira?"

"Yeah?"

He lifted the clothes. "Thank you. For everything."

She nodded. "Don't mention it."

It took him longer than it should have to get dressed, though not at all because of his aching joints and muscles—though they certainly put a damper on his efforts. The temptation to stop and read Xiomara's letter was more than enough reason to stall, but he persevered.

He left Nysara that night, thankful to walk in darkness without light to read by.

⊱─━━━━⊱༻●༺⊰━━━━─⊰

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